Manufacturing concrete news

My Supermodel Wife and I were on our way home with our daughter after a community meeting last night when, on a whim, we decided to stop by Sheridan's Frozen Custard on 75th Street.

Someone mentioned at the meeting that Sheridan's was giving away free "concretes" if you mentioned that you "love KMBC Channel 9."

Now, "love" isn't a word I would use to describe any TV station, unless it's in the context of "I love to bash Larry Moore." But then again, who am I to scoff at a free frozen custard treat.

Then we pulled into the parking lot at 75th and Metcalf and realized that nothing is free. Check out the picture (from the KMBC website).

At the 75th Street location, the line stretched around the entire building. Sure, you don't have to pay money for the frozen custard, but you'll have to wait on line for an hour. It took us about two seconds to decide we didn't want to pay the price for Sheridan's, and about 10 minutes to drive over the Foo's Fabulous, which is right by our house anyway.

I would rather pay the 12 bucks to treat my family rather than make them stand in line with a bunch of moochers. Actually, that's not fair. I don't begrudge those who wanted a free frozen snack. What I really begrudge is KMBC reporting on this like it was a news story.

Look, I tune in to the local nightly news to get updates on Paris Hilton's jail sentence, the Iranian stance on porn stars and the bayou ban on baggy pants, not this meaningless manufactured tripe about people getting free frozen desserts.

To spend so much time setting up an event and then foisting the reporting on an unsuspecting public smacks of Rathergate.

tagged: news, KMBC, Larry Moore, media, Iran, porn star, Dan Rather

3A.M. Poll: What's your favorite goombah lingo?

This week's poll is an homage to the recent Sopranos series non-finale. If you were a fan of the show (like me) then you already know what these terms mean. If you never watched an episode (gavone!) you can look them up in the Mobspeak glossary.

As always, feel free to add you own candidates in the comments.



tagged: poll, vote, Sopranos, wise guy, slang, mobspeak

YouTube Tuesday: Back to the questions

I don't think there's any child of the '80s who doesn't remember the Back to the Future trilogy with great fondness.

Like the Rubik's Cube, the Super Bowl Shuffle, Valley Girls, Pet Shop Boys and other relics of a bygone era, we get a sense of sweet nostalgia when we think of nutty Marty McFly, the scatterbrained Dr. Emmet Brown an the lovable but misunderstood Biff Tannen.

But as many questions and the trilogy tied up in the final movie, there are still things I want to know: What was Michael J. Fox like? Was that real manure? Well, you get the idea.

Luckily, Tom Wilson (who played the Biff and other Tannens in the series) took time out during a recent tour to set a few things straight.



tagged: movies, YouTube, video, Back to the Future, Tom Wilson, comedy, pop culture, humor, Michael J. Fox

For a smile they can share the night

It was the end of an era.

After eight years of watching Tony Soprano become more and more detestable, after watching him devolve from in insecure villainous letch to a despicable sociopath who cares about nobody - not his wife, kids, friends, sister, uncle - but himself, we were finally going to see him get popped.

After faithfully viewing every uncut episode of what is arguably the defining television program of the decade, we would get to see what we've been waiting for through all the long hiatuses.

We set the DVR (just in case), put the kid to be early and I even made up a Blandwagian Ale for the occasion.
Some of my predictions came true. I predicted that Paulie would turn state's evidence, and I'm not sure sure that didn't happen. I predicted a near-death experience would snap AJ out of his depression (as it did for Tony), although I thought it would be from a shooting rather than his car blowing up.

But I certainly didn't predict that David Chase would lose his stugots when it came to ending the series.

As you already know by now, the final scene built the tension with tight shots of ordinary people inside a diner with the chords of Journey's Don't Stop Believing playing in the background. There was a normal family, a troop of Boy Scouts, just regular people out having dinner. Then the camera would focus malevolently on nefarious looking individuals - a goombah came in alone to sit at the counter, and later a pair of black gangsta-looking fellows.

As Meadow struggles to park her car and the Steve Perry wails "Paying anything to roll the dice just one more time..." the goombah gets up and walks toward Tony, Carmella and AJ, eyeing them with bad intent. At the last minute he turns to walk into the restroom.

The tension is palpable. We're on the edge of our couch cushions just waiting for the universe (or at least Phil Leotardo's crew) to dispense its justice at the muzzle of an untraceable 9 mm Glock.

Then, just as Meadow walks in... the screen goes blank.

What the hell just happened? Did our DVR just malfunction? I frantically begin pushing buttons on the remote to try to diagnose why we lost our picture.

And as the credits begin to roll, I realize that there was no DVR malfunction. We've been had. David Chase sucked us in, got us all excited only to leave me alone and unsatisfied just like Courtney Platte did to me my senior year in high school (different story).

Anyway, I can see Chase's dilemma. There was probably no way he could have written an ending that wouldn't be criticized for the next three weeks. Anything he did would have been a let down, just like when the last Seinfeld episode ran.

But COME ON! You could at least try!

The only explanation, other than Chase's loss of testicular fortitude, is that he wanted to leave the series open for a movie sequel. I guess in that case, Steve Perry would be right: "Oh, the movie never ends It goes on and on and on and on."

tagged: Sopranos, HBO, TV, Journey, David Chase, Steve Perry, pop culture

The Judgment of Paris

XO has a pretty good take on the issue, but so do these guys (mature audiences only please).



tagged: Paris, Hilton, jail, justice, humor, satire

YouTube Tuesday supplemental: It's not TV

Well we all know that The Sopranos is winding down on Sunday, and with the death of Tony there will be one less watchable program on the tele.

But, I'm pretty stoked about a new series featuring Flight of the Conchords, New Zealand's fourth most popular guitar-based digi-bongo acapella-rap-funk-comedy folk duo.

When we saw the promo a couple of weeks ago, I couldn't wait for the show to air. It turns out, I don't have to. HBO has released the first full episode on their website in advance. Here it is embedded for your entertainment.


tagged: HBO, Sopranos, Flight of the Conchords, TV, video, pop culture

Random photo

I shot this pic of our house last week after one of the many rainy nights.


UPDATE: Based on advice from the photographically gifted Gnade, I've adjusted the contrast a little. I think it's an improvement.



UPDATE 2: The aforementioned Bill Gnade graciously sent over his interpretation, converting to black and white and really capturing the highlights of the water droplets. Thanks again, Bill!


tagged: photo, picture, rain, morning, siding

Friday Blogthing: Equal time

I think I took the questions on these quizzes a little too seriously, but I'm okay with the results. I think if there were one more quiz, it would find that I'm about 75% Drunkard.

You Are 12% Democrat

If you have anything in common with the Democrat party, it's by sheer chance. You're a staunch conservative, and nothing is going to change that!

How Democrat Are You?

You Are 16% Republican

If you have anything in common with the Republican party, it's by sheer chance. You're a staunch liberal, and nothing is going to change that!

How Republican Are You?

tagged: quiz, poll, Republican, Democrat, politics

What we pretend to be

Some of Tony's recent posts reminded me of this quote I saw on the AV Club a few months ago when Kurt Vonnegut died...

"We must be careful about what we pretend to be."

In Mother Night, apolitical expatriate American playwright Howard W. Campbell, Jr. refashions himself as a Nazi propagandist in order to pass coded messages on to the U.S. generals and preserve his marriage to a German woman—their "nation of two," as he calls it. But in serving multiple masters, Campbell ends up ruining his life and becoming an unwitting inspiration to bigots. In his 1966 introduction to the paperback edition, Vonnegut underlines Mother Night's moral: "We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be." That lesson springs to mind every time a comedian whose shtick relies on hoaxes and audience-baiting—or a political pundit who traffics in shock and hyperbole—gets hauled in front of the court of public opinion for pushing the act too far. Why can't people just say what they mean?

tagged: Kurt Vonnegut, race, blog, blogging, Tony's Kansas City

The More You Know: Lebanon, Kansas

Here's a fun Kansas fact: The geographic center of the "lower 48" United States is just a couple miles outside of Lebanon, KS.

We visited the village of Lebanon during our road trip last weekend to pick up our yearly supply of beef. For the last few years, (I discussed this in a previous post) we have been buying our own, custom-grown beef.

I just feel better about avoiding the corporate feedlot industry. You know, cutting down on the risk of residual growth hormones and estrogen, antibiotics, mad cow disease and the like. Check out this article and you'll see what I mean.

Plus, at about two bucks a pound, it makes economic sense. And I don't think any illegal aliens will lose their jobs because of little old me.

Anyway we picked up our beef in Lebanon, which I discovered from the picture on the grain elevator is also known for growing wheat and corn dogs.
tagged: Lebanon, Kansas, beef, wheat, corn dogs, mad cow, hormones